#BookmarkThis: Alec Baldwin: 'People are having a tougher time laughing about Trump'

During a chat on Facebook Live, author Alec Baldwin read a segment from 'You Can't Spell America Without Me,' co-written with Kurt Andersen. The new book plays off Baldwin's Emmy-award winning 'Saturday Night Live' impersonation of the president.
USA Today

Alec Baldwin gets into character as President Trump in an image from 'You Can't Spell America Without Me.'(Photo: Mark Seliger)

Alec Baldwin has brought his Emmy-award winning Saturday Night Live impersonation of President Trump to book form in the new parody You Can’t Spell America Without Me: The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump (Penguin Press). Baldwin, whose best-selling 2017 memoir Nevertheless was just reissued in paperback, spoke with USA TODAY’s Jocelyn McClurg in New York during a #BookmarkThis author chat on Facebook. Here are highlights:

Q: You teamed up on the book with Kurt Andersen, the author and political commentator. How did you two work together?

A: We met a couple of times, not too often, about what an angle might be. Kurt’s angle was that it would be a memoir of Trump’s first 100 days in office, in Trump’s voice. He would send me bundles of a few chapters and I would send him some notes. … He wrote 99% of the book, which is what I wanted.

Q: One thing that will delight readers are the original photos in the book, which are a scream, including pictures taken at Trump Tower. Did tourists gawk?

A: A lot of police are around Trump Tower for obvious reasons, but they didn’t bother us because you can walk down that sidewalk and it’s unobstructed. We were there, paused, shot the pictures, and nobody said a word to us.

Q: How closely do you work with the 'SNL' writers on the scripts for the cold openings?

A: If they come up to me and have something to show me and I don’t like it, we just don’t do it. Trump is always at a podium as president addressing some crowd — coal miners or auto workers — and you don’t often get intimate Trump, Trump one-on-one, alone with someone, and I’m always lobbying for that. Or they’ll say a line that I don’t want to say, bashing someone I don’t want to bash. There are people I’m happy to bash and those I don’t want to bash. They do listen, but the overall nature of the sketch, the idea, I defer to them a thousand percent.

Alec Baldwin as President Trump in front of Trump Tower, a photo from his new book.(Photo: Mark Seliger)

Q: You and the president aren’t exactly fans of each other. He has said that your portrayal “stinks” and is “mean-spirited.” Your response? And what do you think he would think of the book?

A: I think the book probably would drive him more crazy than anything because it sounds like it’s his voice. … As far as how Trump accepts the ridicule, we’re in a place in this country where making fun of Trump, and this is just my opinion, is winding down. I doubt (special prosecutor Robert) Mueller will put the country through the worst of his indictment menu prior to the holidays. I think he’ll let everybody have a nice Thanksgiving and a nice Christmas. Then it’s going to be bombs away on more people who are going to get indicted. … I think it’s going to start getting pretty grim after the first of the year. I think the book is an incredibly funny book, but I think people are having a tougher time laughing about (Trump).

Q: What about your own political aspirations?

A: I wish I could, but I don’t think I can because of my children. If I were a younger man and I had more time, if I had more of that equity in my pocket to play with, maybe I would. But right now my wife’s going to have another baby, which will pretty much function as my 60th birthday present, so I’m going to try to spend as much time with my kids as I can.